Prostitution bill clears first legislative hurdle

SANTA FE — A proposal that would modernize New Mexico law to allow prosecutors to charge people who run online prostitution websites cleared its first legislative hurdle Tuesday.

The push to crackdown on prostitution rings based in cyberspace stems from a case in which two aging college professors were accused of helping run a prostitution website.

Just last week, the New Mexico Supreme Court denied a request from prosecutors to continue pursuing the case against former University of New Mexico president F. Chris Garcia and retired Fairleigh Dickinson University physics professor David C. Flory. The court ruled that nothing in state law made the professors' website illegal.

Experts have said decades-old laws in New Mexico and other states make it difficult for authorities and prosecutors to go after prostitution-linked websites because the laws don't necessarily outlaw the practice in cyberspace. Most states' laws only address street prostitution and brothels, they said.

Rep. Tim Lewis, R-Rio Rancho, said his bill aims to close the loophole. It would add language making the promotion of prostitution using "an electronic, virtual or online forum or an Internet website" illegal.

"I want this bill to not so much be a fix or solution to the recent Garcia case. It needs to be a fix of the outdated and antiquated laws that we have right now," Lewis said after his bill was approved by the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee.

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He noted that more New Mexico laws will likely have to be reviewed to ensure there are not more cyberspace loopholes.

Lewis' bill is among a handful introduced during this 60-day session that target prostitution and human trafficking. Some of the measures call for tougher penalties, while one would establish a hotline for reporting human trafficking.

In the case of the professors, Garcia and Flory were arrested by Albuquerque police in June 2011 on charges of promoting prostitution after a yearlong police investigation into an alleged multistate operation in which prostitutes and patrons could meet.

A lower court ruled in favor of the professors last summer, saying that an online message board could not be considered a house of prostitution under state law.